How the meta worth the hype? [v4]

Maybe an unpopular opinion but here we go.

For context, I am working with a pretty modest budget so high-end suggestions probably will not land. Spent the last few weekends digging into this and the deeper I go the more questions I have. I tried three different approaches and none of them felt quite right.

The trade-offs here are not obvious to me and I keep flip-flopping. This came up at a meetup recently and the room was split, so curious what the broader community thinks. Spent the last few weekends digging into this and the deeper I go the more questions I have.